My work is done

It's official, Erics car is all the way done, K pro and tuned by church automotive. It's an indescribable feeling to have seen this project from start to finish, too see the happiness that his car brings him makes everything worth it. In the beginning his expectation and desire to have the fastest street dominating car was a bit unrealistic, so to convince him that a k20 would be fast when all he wanted was to beat super cars and motorcycles was a bit of a challenge. But to be honest with him having that much power in a daily street car would be pointless, all you would do is spin out everywhere and lose races because you weren't at a prepped  track rather on an inconsistent street. So I told him to have faith in me and let me build him a fast reliable car. With this weight on my shoulders and not knowing if an all motor k20 would meet his unrealistic demands for power, I proceeded to build his car.  I knew that a k20 would be more then enough power to make a fast car, especially in a civic hatch platform. Horsepower is just a number, it's all about power to weight ratio and how you use the power. I hate people that say " if we were at a track I would smoke you." Or "if I had slicks I could beat you." Eat a dick douche bag, don't bring a gun to a knife fight. Always in the back of my mind I was worried that his car wouldn't  be fast enough for him. But a month ago when I deliverd the car to him I was much excited when he was pleased with the performance of his car, and the constant phone calls trough the month to help drive home the fact that he loves it. Mind you this was PRE tune, stock ecu only making 210-220 hp to the wheels. 

So as of today I'm happy to say that the car is on kpro and completely tuned, with numbers exceeding my expectations  and his expectations. He couldn't be happier that the car is making 250 hp and 174 ftlb torque. He realizes that he's not going to be beating Ferraris and Lamborghinis but he is more then excited with the end result of it, which makes me feel very relived. 

I didn't have cameras or anything so all the pics and videos are from my phone. So sorry in advance for quality. 

Throwing some new plugs in before the tune 

Thanks to justin my Honda hookup with out him this project would have cost a million bucks. 

At churches

And the final reaults. 

How to clean K20 Idle Air Control Valve ( IACV )

                  I am making this post because... When i first started up my brothers K swap I was first excited that it was running well,, but after a min of smooth idle it would begin to surge. Which as most Honda owners know its most likely a Throttle Position Sensor ( TPS ) issue or a IACV issue. So after checking my voltage and correctly setting the TPS the motor would still surge once it was warmed up, (bummer)I did some research online and came to the conclusion that the IACV needed to be cleaned. all the articles said just take it off the throttle body and spray some carb cleaner in it and bam it should be fixed. Seems easy enough, bought some carb cleaner took off the throttle body and took the IACV off , sprayed the carb cleaner some black stuff came out. Put the IACV back on the throttle body, put the throttle body back on the car, started it and same issue once it was warmed up, surge surge surge. i knew there was something i was missing so i took it back off and just figured it out for myself. Below are my results, step by step on how to completely clean your IACV so it works good as new. feast on the fruits of my labor.


So Step 1.

 Is obviously take the throttle body off the intake manifold. you do this by taking a off  your intake, take off the throttle cable, remove the two small water lines that go to the IACV, disconnect the tps, disconnect the map sensor, disconnect the IACV plug, and there are 4 12mm bolts that hold the throttle body to the intake manifold. you should be left with this

 As you can see the IACV is on the bottom of the throttle body.

Step 2.

Get a Phillips screw driver and remove the two Phillips screws hold the IACV to the throttle body, make sure you press firmly on the screw driver as to not strip the screws out. Stripping the screws out isn't a life ender, but it would just be easier if you didn't strip them out.

Step 3. 

Pull the IACV off, it should come off with ease. Mind the rubber gasket and the two screws. i put the int he throttle body and set it aside so I don't lose any of them.

Step 4. 

You will now need to  disassemble the IACV, this is the most tricky part. You notice that the IACV sensor has two "star" screws holding it together, they aren't any Allen wrench sizes, and they aren't torx bit sizes. Im sure somewhere someone know hat tool to you to take the screws out, but i just use a grinder with a cut off wheel and just make a small slit in the head of the bolt to make it a "flat head" screw now.

Step 5.

Take a fairly large flat head screw driver and apply direct pressure and turn counter clock wise to loosen the two screws. I realize that in the pics it is hard to see the slits i created in the screw heads.

Step 6.

Now the IACV should come apart and you will notice that there might be rust, or other gunk in both pieces, this is where you will spray the carb cleaner into both parts to clean it all out.

Step 7. 

In the last picture from step 6 you see my left index finger is pointing to a small silver cylinder that has a small tab on it and a shaft the goes through a bearing. you must be able to freely spin this with your fingers this means that the IACV is going to be fully functioning. If yours is like mine and after spraying carb cleaner into it, it still doesn't spin. then you are going to have to use some WD-40 or other lubricant to free the shaft and allow it to spin freely. this is very important, The way the IACV works is is by sensing how hot the engine is and it does this by reading the coolant temp as it goes through the IACV. once warm enough it will allow the shaft to spin around blocking a small hole that allows the car to have a steady low idle, much like a choke. if this shaft cant freely spin then it can't properly block the small hole allowing air in, thus acting like a vacuum leak causing a surging idle.

Step 8.

 Now that your IACV is freely spinning with ease. ( note this might take some time, a lot of finger spinning, and WD-40 to continue to flush it out) if you don't take the time to make sure it is freely spinning then when you put it all back together its probably still going to surge. now re assemble to IACV using the two screws you made slits in.

Step 9. 

Re attach the IACV to the throttle body using the two Phillips screws and rubber gasket that you stashed in the throttle body for safe keeping. if you forget the rubber gasket then the coolant is going to leak into your throttle body.

Step 10. YOU'RE DONE!!!!!!! now just re install the throttle body and attach all sensors, hoses, throttle cable, and air intake. ( mine is missing a few sensor and im not going to be re installing it onto my motor, as the motor is currently not in the car and i need new gaskets) but this should help you get your car to stop surging. 

Bitten off more than i can chew.

                Biting off more then I can chew is a direct result of my desire to have the coolest and best of everything. Within the last 6 months some great opportunities have come my way and i didn't have enough will power to say no. Lets go back to May2014...I might have a hard time getting the story to make sense, but just try and keep up.

 My brother has always had the plan that when he gets money he wanted me to build him a fast car, from early 2014 the plan was to build him a LS2 S13. But after much thought and idea throwing around between Ever and I we decided that having 400rwhp was at bit much for a DAILY DRIVEN street car. I mean my RB25 S13 is outta control and it only puts out 265rwhp, so having 400rwhp was just going to be down right dumb. Literally you wouldn't be able to pass people on the street or merge on the freeway with out creating a scene, tire smoke and painting elevens all over the street would get old pretty quick. So the next idea we had was a civic, that's my bread and butter. I've been building Hondas since i was 16. With reliability and daily driveability being the main focus of this build i decided to take on the all mighty K swap, since the motors are newer they would be very low mileage which was great for reliability, and being a K series it would be plenty fast.

So now lets pause the car situation, and throw some other form of speed and temptation in the mix. The MOTORCYCLE... when my brother left for the District of Columbia to join Americas Naval force he left me with his supermoto leaving him no transportation. With the desire to acquire another supermoto he put me on the hunt to research and come up with the best bike he could get that would be comfortable and have the ability to drive long distance at high speeds, which was the major set back of his previous supermoto. So after a few weeks of looking into get another supermoto it became evident that a supermoto probably wasn't the best idea since most supermotos are just single cylinder, or twin cylinders which aren't the ideal for sustained high speed and RPM. Then one day  the answer was right in front of my face, literally on the cover of mens health magazine. there is was the 2014 Yamaha FZ-09, upright seating and comfortable, 850cc triple, naked styling, and the ability to travel great distances and still be a ton of fun. so in October 2013 he purchased the first FZ-09 in D.C. It didn't take long to realize that having a brand new bike payment, full coverage insurance, and being his first year in the Navy equaled not enough money to live. So here is the first great opportunity he bestowed upon me,  the chance to have the bike and take care of it for him until he is out of the navy and all i had to do was make the insurance payment and he would make the bike payment. NO BRAINER right? well that's what i thought. But turns out that the insurance payment was quite a bit even for me being 31 years old.

So now im the owner of two bikes, a 96 Kawasaki and a 2014 Yamaha.( lets not mention the other four cars that i have). So by now it is june 2014 and he has accumulated enough money to do the civic project, so lets begin that story.

June 2014, A large sum of money has just be deposited into my account, and the start of a bad idea was brewing in my mind. It seemed like a good idea at the time, "Hey Bro spot me the 5k so i can do a Kswap in my civic too." Of course being my brother how could he say no, He loves me and knows how much having a K series in my car would mean to me. My plan was to sell my B16 Full Swap outta my car and pay him back for most of the 5k that i owed him then sell some other things i had laying around to square up the deal. So with his approval we drove to HMO and purchased 2 JDM DC5 full swaps and it was the best day ever! when i got back into vegas i purchased a bunch of parts i needed to start doing the swap into his civic (which i forgot to mention that i bought before i picked up the motors) a bone stock civic vx. the most perfect of candidates for this motor swap or any motor swap, plus they look awesome and i have one too.

Now this is where the project starts to lose momentum, after buying a 94 civic vx, 2 Kswaps, and the first round of parts to get his project going. the money started to run out and the cost of owning a motorcycle started to add up. Helmet, gloves, jacket, exhaust, oil changes, new tires, and the insurance was starting to make it difficult to consistently purchase kswap parts for his car with each of my checks. so we had agreed that it was time to sell the supermoto that i had, and put that money right into his car. I was able to quickly sell the supermoto and it wasn't long till the next round of parts for his car started to come in. This whole time i was working on his car i was also trying to sell my complete B16 swap outta my car to continue to fund his car, this was proving to be impossible though no one wanted to fork over good money for a strong, healthy, reliable, real parts having motor swap. So after almost six months of not having my civic running, missing events, and fun things along the way i decided it was time to put my motor back in my car and at least enjoy it.

December 16th 2014, my garage is full. there is a civic that runs and drives, a motorcycle that i drive everyday, and a baller ass unfinished civic project that haunts me every time i go in the garage.  I realize that i am in over my head, I have bitten of more then i can chew, and am now spending more money on all of these things then the money that i have coming in, and finishing my brothers civic will never happen. From the very start i told my self that i cant buy ANYTHING for my civic, nothing for the kswap, nothing to make the car better, NOTHING. I couldn't do anything to any of my cars till his was done and out of the garage. basically vegas' car scene is crap, people only want blackworks and STR wheels, they don't want quality they just want the look. No one is forking over money to buy my swap. they would rather buy a backyard built LS/Vtec swap that is garbage. So therefore this has put a halt on progress, my motor is still for sale and is currently in my car and running.

The most frustrating part of this whole debacle is that it was my selfishness that has brought me to where i am now. i have an unfinished project, I let my brother down, and i have a K20 just sitting in my garage waiting for me to put in my car. most people in my situation would sell the extra  K20, or possibly sell one of my cars to fund it. But not me i want my cake and i want to eat it too. And there is no way I'm letting the k20 swap go, it would be like carrying a baby for 9 months then adopting it out when its born. It really is that important to me.

So to sum up that long ass story. having a motorcycle, and trying to 2 k swaps is very expensive.

Here are some pictures of whats going on in the garage right now.

 Here is the route of my problem, this thing is the funnest thing in the world. its faster then both of my cars put together, it looks cooler then both of them, and it often makes me wonder why i even fix up cars since it is so much faster then anything on four wheels.

Here is my broken dreams.

My car as it sits, waiting for someone to buy the FULL SWAP.

Since i cant put money into my car, i decided to take things out. totally gutting the whole car pretty much.

This is how my brother car is currently sitting. Gobs and gobs of juicy parts, Ktuned AC/PS delete pulley, ktuned radiator hoses and heater core hoseses, Ktuned clutch line,Hybrid racing timing chain tensioner, Exedy clutch, karcepts complete fuel system, karcepts cold air intake, karcepts throttle cable bracket and oem gsr cable, Hasport mounts, Rbc intake manifold, Aem Fuel pressure regulator, Hondata intake manifold gasket, Brand new OEM si clutch master, and countless other new oem  parts, nuts, bolts, sensors all over the car.the brakes are completely done. Gsr knuckles, Gsr calipers, Gsr booster, DA master cylinder, 40/40 prop valve, rear si discs, brembo cross drilled/slotted rotors, stoptech pads.

Ktuned traction bar, Jdm type r sway bar, Ktuned No cut shifter box.

Almost looks stock.

Old school/New school for lack of better words

One day.

ONE CAR GARAGE

                                     i don't get on this as much as i used to, ever since i got instagram i pretty much post pictures on there and neglect the blog. but today i figured since i was bored at home i would take a few snaps of my one car in my one car garage. its pretty tight quarters in there working on car is definitely a challenge. my water pump gasket started leaking real bad so im changing the water pump.